Corsair Graphite 230T Windowed Case Review

Peter Donnell / 11 years ago

Final Thoughts

Price

The Corsair Graphite 230T is available in the UK for anywhere between £55 and £60 from most popular online retailers, after a quick search I found it at CCL for a very reasonable £57.62. It is available in the US from Newegg and many other retailers for around $79.99. This makes it fantastic value for money overall and it’s certainly going to prove fierce competition when compared with similar priced products from Cooler Master, Antec and Aerocool to name but a few.

Overview

From start to finish on this review I have known that this chassis was going to be great. As soon as it was taken out of the box it was clear that it was very well made from quality steel and plastics with a flawless, if somewhat dazzlingly bright orange paint job. Throughout the build process I couldn’t find anything wrong with it in terms of quality and there were no loose panels, rough edges or unpainted sections to worry about.

Design is subjective, but overall I think it is a great looking case and it certainly stands out from the crowd in this price range. There are a few draw backs overall that I have to mention, such as their being no dust filter on the fan mount in the base of the chassis, a very prime source of dust can be straight up from your floor, especially if you have carpet not hard flooring. Then we have the fact that I cannot install a 240mm radiator in the top, I understand Corsair need to draw the line in terms of features as some point in their design to keep cost right, but I bet there are many Corsair fans who want nothing more than to put a H100i in the top of this thing. Those two very minor issues aside, there is a lot of great design here too, the 4+4 hard drive bays are super easy to use and tool free, there is a great side panel window, flat USB 3.0 cables that are easy to manage, not forgetting dual USB 3.0 ports when most chassis in this price range still only have one.

The front panel design looks great too and despite it being mostly plastic, it doesn’t look especially cheap, in fact the whole chassis doesn’t look or feel anything less than premium quality. Overall this chassis is absolutely fantastic value for money, something that is proven even further by the inclusion of three decent 120mm fans, meaning you can focus on spending more of your budget on other components. It’s not the greatest chassis in the world, but at this price range you can do so much worse and in terms of design the bright colours of the 230T are a refreshing break from the often dark or glossy plastic cover chassis that dominate to sub £60 price range.

Pros

Three pre-installed fans (two with LED lighting)
Clear side panel window
High quality finish to plastics and paint
Two USB 3.0 ports
Black sleeved internal cables
Room for 6 fans maximum
Dust filter on PSU and front panel
Price

Cons

No dust filter for bottom fan mount position
Front panel needs to be removed to clean filter, this involves removing both side panels.
No top radiator support

“For under £60 this is easily one of the best chassis you can buy, plenty of room for storage, multiple graphics cards and a great overall design that will make for a fantastic looking gaming system. Build quality is on par with what we have come to expect from a Corsair chassis and the 230T is a worthy addition to their range”